Guidance for cyclist who's new to rowing/erg?
Posted: October 16th, 2024, 9:11 pm
First post here, looking forward to being part of the community.
My wife and I recently completed a beginner sculling course, so we're just at the start of the learning curve on the water (humbling for sure).
We were introduced to the erg's at the club (all c2's) and decided to get an erg for the house. I am currently travelling/camped in Arkansas for a bike race next weekend and lucked out finding a basically new C2 RowErg on facebook nearby. So yeah, I got some interesting looks while doing a little rowing at the campground.
Anyways, I'm an avid cyclist with a good aerobic engine (mostly focused on 5+hour races). 55yr old, 6' tall, ~75kg. I'm hoping that rowing/erg can be good cross training (particularly in the off season) and help provide some core and upper body fitness. I'm a classic cyclist, all legs/butt with weak t-rex arms and upper body. I am also a numbers/wattage nerd, so naturally my first inclination is to see what I can do on the RowErg and try to hit some decent numbers. But I also don't want to hurt myself or get into bad habits, so hoping for a little guidance from folks who might have followed a similar path.
I got the erg today and spent enough time to get some feel for it. Set the drag at ~115 and and rowed for about 15 minutes. As expected, my arms/shoulders/back were feeling it pretty quick, but I could keep that in check by reducing the arm pull effort at the end of the stroke and basically just bringing the handle to my chest (pace didn't drop when I did this, so probably compensating more with legs). So, is that good practice for now or should I be focused on working my weaker arms and back to failure? Also, my current plan is to just go easy pace and up the volume for a month or so to work on form before starting to push things. Or would some harder intervals or mixing it up make sense? Any other tips/guidance is greatly appreciated, thanks.
My wife and I recently completed a beginner sculling course, so we're just at the start of the learning curve on the water (humbling for sure).
We were introduced to the erg's at the club (all c2's) and decided to get an erg for the house. I am currently travelling/camped in Arkansas for a bike race next weekend and lucked out finding a basically new C2 RowErg on facebook nearby. So yeah, I got some interesting looks while doing a little rowing at the campground.
Anyways, I'm an avid cyclist with a good aerobic engine (mostly focused on 5+hour races). 55yr old, 6' tall, ~75kg. I'm hoping that rowing/erg can be good cross training (particularly in the off season) and help provide some core and upper body fitness. I'm a classic cyclist, all legs/butt with weak t-rex arms and upper body. I am also a numbers/wattage nerd, so naturally my first inclination is to see what I can do on the RowErg and try to hit some decent numbers. But I also don't want to hurt myself or get into bad habits, so hoping for a little guidance from folks who might have followed a similar path.
I got the erg today and spent enough time to get some feel for it. Set the drag at ~115 and and rowed for about 15 minutes. As expected, my arms/shoulders/back were feeling it pretty quick, but I could keep that in check by reducing the arm pull effort at the end of the stroke and basically just bringing the handle to my chest (pace didn't drop when I did this, so probably compensating more with legs). So, is that good practice for now or should I be focused on working my weaker arms and back to failure? Also, my current plan is to just go easy pace and up the volume for a month or so to work on form before starting to push things. Or would some harder intervals or mixing it up make sense? Any other tips/guidance is greatly appreciated, thanks.